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Chandigarh: Women shine bright at PEC convocation
As many as 496 BTech degrees were awarded to students of various branches of engineering; apart from this, 63 PG students walked away with MTech degrees and 14 scholars were bestowed PhD degrees at PEC Chandigarh
Amid efforts to increase the number of women in tech, a significant number of female students bagged medals at the 54th annual convocation held by Punjab Engineering College (PEC) on Saturday.
In the BTech category, 19 gold medals were awarded, with four going to women, and among the eight silver medals, two were awarded to female recipients.
Suvidhi from Jalandhar was feted with the Baldev Krishna Gupta Award for Engineering Excellence and silver medal in computer science engineering. “Being a female entrepreneur is challenging. People take women’s compassion and empathy as lack of assertiveness,” she said while acknowledging PEC’s immense support that allowed her to participate in the generational Google scholarship scheme for women and pursue an internship with Amazon as well.
Now, working as a software engineer at JP Morgan, Suvidhi said she was looking forward to launching her own startup in the future, while also sharing her interest in pursuing a masters in aerospace engineering.
As many as 496 BTech degrees were awarded to students of various branches of engineering. Apart from this, 63 PG students walked away with MTech degrees and 14 scholars were bestowed PhD degrees.
Out of 763 total degrees, 573 students were awarded degrees in person and 190 in absentia.
Punjab governor and UT administrator Gulab Chand Kataria, the chief guest, congratulated PEC for completing 100 years of academic excellence and technological contributions on November 9, 2021. Tracing the institute’s history, the governor shared that PEC was established as Mughalpura Engineering College in Lahore, Pakistan, in 1921, and underwent several transitions, including moving to Roorkee post-partition in 1947, before settling in Chandigarh in 1953. In 2003, the institute was conferred Deemed University status.
Twin triumph for Noida sisters
Kanisha Kaur and Kanika Kaur, identical twins from Noida, were a rare sight, having attained over 9.5 CGPA.
PEC confirmed Kanika’s CGPA of 9.73 was the highest among all BTech graduates this year, earning her a gold medal and several more awards in her branch — computer science engineering.
Kanika said being a woman wasn’t as challenging for her because her sister Kanisha was with her throughout. While Kanisha had opted for electronics and communication engineering, the two sisters picked the same electives. Hailing from Noida, they lived with their grandparents in Chandigarh through their course.
Both sisters said they were interested in maths and science from the beginning, but were now in a dilemma whether to pursue an MBA or an MS degree next.
Kanisha, who scored a CGPA of 9.58, said being together at PEC allowed them to complement each other when it came to notes and their studies.
Raisel Nanda from Panchkula earned a silver medal in civil engineering. She was among a group of students whose research project had highlighted road safety issues outside four city schools using the International Road Assessment Programme and the Star Rating For Schools (SR4S) system.
Girl in wheelchair wants to fly like Kalpana Chawla
Manasvi Dhiman from Saharanpur in Uttar Pradesh was one of the graduating BTech students. Suffering from fibular hemimelia since birth, she has been using a wheelchair since she was six years old. Just last month she underwent a surgery, when doctors had tried to save her foot, but couldn’t.
On Saturday, however, she wore a warm smile as she and her peers received their degrees. “My inspiration for becoming an engineer was Kalpana Chawla. I have been obsessed with her since I was a child. My parents supported me in my dream,” she beamed.
Following in the footsteps of her idol, Manasvi pursued aeronautical engineering and is now eyeing a post-graduate degree in the same field from one of the European universities.
